The Magpie
by sharkinterviewee
Summary: The Peraltiago AU in which they're on opposite sides of the law. Amy: a prolific art thief, and Jake: the lead detective on the manhunt for the criminal known as the Magpie.


"Stop! NYPD! Put your hands up!" Jake shouted at the suspected clad in black who was now cornered on the roof. He had his gun trained on the figure, still facing away from him, black gloved hands now hovering in the air. Caught, he thought. No one had any idea what the illusive art thief even looked like, the only physical description being that he was an expert in hand to hand combat and easily subdued multiple museum guards on the few occasions that the thief ran into them. None of the guards ever saw more than a figure in all black, and all the robberies occurred at night- the most precise description anyone could ever give was 'strong'. Every robbery was meticulously planned, so the thief rarely ran into problems anyway. Jake had been on the trail for months, always one step behind. Not tonight though.

"Jake Peralta, right? I was worried you were catching up to me. You've got a high learning curve detective."

When the figure turned around and smiled at him, Jake was a little stunned when he saw the face of the criminal he's been chasing for months, but quickly steeled himself. From witness accounts everyone said the Magpie was a guy, though they never got a very good look at the international art thief.

So he wasn't expecting a woman on the roof. And he really wasn't expecting the blinding smile that was just beautiful. An attractive criminal was still a criminal, but a very stupid part of him couldn't help but have the thought that she belonged in an art museum as a painting.

"Put your hands up," he ordered, motioning with his gun.

"You aren't even gonna say hi the first time we meet?" She pouted, like the arresting officer was being rude for not giving her a proper greeting.

"Hello. Now put your hands on your head."

"Don't suppose there's any chance you'd let me walk past you, huh?" She asked, still smiling. He was standing right between her and the door that he'd just come running out of, which was, incidentally, the only entrance and exit the roof had. No way out.

"Nope."

She nodded at that, like it was what she had expected. Even so, she was so calm and relaxed that it was setting him on edge how not nervous she was when she was under arrest with no chance to escape. Did she have a backup plan? There wasn't any way off the roof other than the stairs they both came up. Why the hell was she so calm?

"You don't even wanna chat?" She sounded disappointed, and way too casual about making conversation for the situation they were in. "No questions to ask? You caught me. There's no way off this roof, and I heard you radio in for backup. Caught me fair and square. Tell me a bit about yourself. After months of leading the search you don't have any questions to ask before all your buddies in blue show up and whisk me off in handcuffs?"

"You know you're nickname's inaccurate, right?" Jake almost cursed himself for engaging, but figured it was best to try to keep her talking until backup arrived. Everyone who worked the case had been warned to have at least two arresting officers when putting the cuffs on the Magpie, considering the whole expert in hand to hand combat thing. Right now, Jake was alone on this roof, and stalling. At least talking meant she wasn't trying to escape.

"What do you mean?" She tilted her head, dark brown hair sweeping over her shoulder with the movement.

"The Magpie. Magpies don't actually steal stuff. They debunked that myth. They're very nice birds, actually. You stealing art is just giving them a worse name. You've been using that name for six years now, but it's been inaccurate for two of them."

"First of all, I'm touched that you've been researching bird facts for little ol' me. Second, I read that study when it first came out, and it was flawed. They only used magpies who already had mates in that study, when it's likely the bachelor magpies do all the stealing to attract ladies with shiny things. As if I don't keep up with news about my bird friends. Besides, I didn't choose the nickname the Magpie because of their stealing reputation."

She only sounded slightly offended that he assumed she didn't know, but he was more caught on to her last sentence. It seemed intuitive that an art thief who went by the Magpie chose the name because of the animals stealing reputation. It made sense and was clever in that sort of self-aware criminal sort of humor- maybe even slightly poetic. But if the art thief mascot thing had nothing to do with those animals being synonymous for stealing- come on, they even had _lullabies_ about magpies stealing jewelry and stuff. Why would a thief chose them for a different reason? What other reason could there be? The name seemed so obvious, and after being on the case for months, it was a surprise to him that the common sense name reasoning was wrong. If not that, then why? He couldn't help but be curious in light of the new, but arguably meaningless information.

"Why did you choose it then?"

"Magpies are pretty smart," she grinned. "I mostly chose it on a whim, because I knew I needed to leave a calling card so some reporter wouldn't give me a stupid ass name that stuck. But the specific thing that interested me was that the European magpie is the only species of non-mammal that can recognize itself in a mirror. There's only a couple animals that can do it anyway, including humans. Magpies are on that list too. Pretty cool, right?" She had the brightest look on her face, paired with one of the most genuine smiles he had ever seen, and Jake almost started smiling back (on pure reflex, _of course_ ).

He resisted the urge when he realized he needed to stay on guard because she was just trying to disarm him. Damn, she was good.

And of course the white collar international art thief was a nerd. Of course, he thought.

"In a few seconds I'm going to pull a gun from behind my back and drop it on the ground and kick it away. Please don't shoot me, Johnny Law. You have my unconditional surrender," she stated slowly, like she was trying to appease him. It was that same tone of voice people used when trying to talk down an attack dog, that sort of lilting voice that was trying to be soothing so they wouldn't provoke a bite. His jaw clenched, sure that there was something dangerous in the gleam of her eyes.

He tightened his grip on his gun as she slowly started reaching behind her back and brought a gun out in front of her, nozzle towards the ground, impossibly slow so he wouldn't think she was trying anything. She then dropped on the concrete below their feet, and kicked it to the side of both of them by a good 20 feet.

She started slowly walking towards him with a soft expression on her face, a smile playing at her lips almost like they were two familiar friends, and he knew he shouldn't let her get any closer.

They had been told to have at least two arresting officers when putting the cuffs on the Magpie- trying to apprehend apprehend a criminal known to be skilled in martial arts was just stupid, and didn't do any good for the four security guards found blindfolded and bound in a storage closet at her last heist.

"Stay back," he warned her, emphasizing once again that he had his gun trained on her.

"You aren't gonna shoot an unarmed man, are you, officer?"

He hesitated, and in the blink of an eye she was right in front of him, and suddenly her lips were on his. She was kissing him. And without permission his lips started responding (the little traitors) and he was actually kissing her back. In the back of his mind Jake knew this was all sorts of not good, but her lips were soft and intoxicating.

Then everything went black.

* * *

 **AN:** **Listen, I'm gonna be honest with y'all. I have plans to eventually turn this into a multichapter fic, but knowing me it'll probably 6 months before chapter two is uploaded. The best predictor for future performance is past behavior, you know? (technically, I first heard that when my psych prof was talking about grades and the final exam, but w/e)**  
 **I can tell you that this fic will pick up with a time skip whenever chapter two does come out.**  
 **Thanks for bearing with me. I just wanted to have fun with this and post it even though I'm nowhere near ready to do the multichapter plans I have for it. Just consider this a temporary one shot, I think.**

 **Also, yes, all that stuff about Magpies is true, so here's another scientifically accurate one shot (cough cough multichapter) from me**


End file.
